Padraig.

My review falls not too hard on either side of preservation/protection or disavowal of national identity markers (although, as an Englishman, I think we could lose some of the more outdated and class-associated Englishness tropes).

My review stems from an unease with how the work might be read — Roberts’ work is not an overt critique, it is a respectfully distanced critique. On first pass, his images look like celebrations of an Englishness that I would say has more to do with the past than the present. My problem with the work is not Roberts’ intention but the misinterpretations or appropriations flag-huggers might make of it.

I might just be worrying too much here and applying issues of race and integration to a body of work that is about something else. Or maybe not? Either way, that the work raises a response is better than doing nothing at all.

A few more thoughts here: http://prisonphotography.org/2015/07/14/some-thoughts-on-simon-roberts-latest-work/